: I give up. "Speaking Freely: A Guided Tour of American English
from Plymouth Rock to Silicon Valley..."
by Stuart Berg Flexner & Anne H. Soukhanov has a "Scud" entry but
it doesn't give the origin of the term. I thought it was an abbreviation
(SCUD) but it is shown as "Scud." Maybe it's a Russian word. Here's
what was in the book: "Scud, a ballistic missile used by the Iraqis
against targets in both Saudi Arabia and Israel. Developed by the
Russians in the 1950s, it was a direct descendant of the German
V-2 used against allied cities in 1944-45. The Iraqis fired a total
of 81 Scuds. The U.S. countered with the Patriot Missile, soon sorted
to the Patriot."